I've not forgotten this series of posts, but random events have left me drained of spoons, and my momentum got rather scattered.

Instead of trying to figure out witty ways to write about how the theme of "parents and children", is the leitmotif of this play, I'm just going to quote all the lines where people of different ages are talked about, and let you see for yourself. In other words, I'm just going to back up the proverbial dump truck, and drop a load of quotes on you, in chronological order in the play... Mostly (I may not be able to resist giving an aside or two).

Anyway, here's the opening boilerplate, with links to the other posts I've made, so far (Please start with Part One, if you haven't already, Part Two is why I am so passionate about this play, and why I want to read it aloud in the town square, so I'd be happy if you read that, too. But you can save it for the end, if you want):

Part Three: Secondary Themes (The relationship between parents and children, the passage of time, and watching children grow up).

Part Four: Plot and Character Crafting

Part Five: Links to other people's interpretations

ARCHIDAMUS: I think there is not in the world either malice or matter to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillius: it is a gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came into my note.

CAMILLO: I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the subject, makes old hearts fresh: they that went on crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to see him a man.

ARCHIDAMUS: Would they else be content to die?

CAMILLO: Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

ARCHIDAMUS: If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one.

Act 1: scene i

[Gotta love a little shade-throwing on Ableism/Ageism!]

LEONTES: [. . .] My brother, Are you so fond of your young prince as we Do seem to be of ours?

[*ahem* -- seem ?? a little foreshadowing there, Will?]

POLIXENES: If at home, sir, He's all my exercise, my mirth, my matter, Now my sworn friend and then mine enemy, My parasite, my soldier, statesman, all: He makes a July's day short as December, And with his varying childness cures in me Thoughts that would thick my blood.

Act 1: scene ii

---

First Lady: Come, my gracious lord, Shall I be your playfellow?

MAMILLIUS: No, I'll none of you.

First Lady: Why, my sweet lord?

MAMILLIUS: You'll kiss me hard and speak to me as if I were a baby still.

[. . .]

[. . .] Pray now What colour are your eyebrows?

First Lady: Blue, my lord.

MAMILLIUS: Nay, that's a mock: I have seen a lady's nose That has been blue, but not her eyebrows.

[That is such a six-year-old's joke: to trick a grown-up into "admitting" they have blue eyebrows!]

[Later, in the same scene, after Leontes has ordered his wife to prison, and publicly accused her of both adultery and plotting to kill him]

ANTIGONUS: (To Leontes) It is for you we speak, not for ourselves: You are abused and by some putter-on That will be damn'd for't; would I knew the villain, I would land-damn him. Be she honour-flaw'd, I have three daughters; the eldest is eleven The second and the third, nine, and some five; If this prove true, they'll pay for't: by mine honour, I'll geld 'em all; fourteen they shall not see, To bring false generations: they are co-heirs; And I had rather glib myself than they Should not produce fair issue.

Act Two: scene i

[Yup, Antigonus is written as unambiguously good in this play, and he's talking of honor killing his own daughters -- he's doing it as hyperbole, to make the point how much he does not believe the king's accusation, but still.... That's an example of how the state of Women's Rights stood in England, when Shakespeare wrote this, if these lines would not have caused a an eyelid to bat. Included for both the specific ages mentioned, and the gender.]

Shepherd: (Coming upon the baby in the basket) I would there were no age between sixteen and three-and-twenty, or that youth would sleep out the rest; for there is nothing in the between but getting wenches with child, wronging the ancientry, stealing, fighting--Hark you now! Would any but these boiled brains of nineteen and two-and-twenty hunt this weather? They have scared away two of my best sheep, which I fear the wolf will sooner find than the master: if any where I have them, 'tis by the seaside, browsing of ivy. Good luck, an't be thy will what have we here! Mercy on 's, a barne a very pretty barne! A boy or a child, I wonder? A pretty one; a very pretty one: sure, some 'scape: though I am not bookish, yet I can read waiting-gentlewoman in the 'scape. This has been some stair-work, some trunk-work, some behind-door-work: they were warmer that got this than the poor thing is here. I'll take it up for pity: yet I'll tarry till my son come; he hallooed but even now. Whoa, ho, hoa!

Act 3: scene iii

Enter Time, the Chorus

Time: I, that please some, try all, both joy and terror Of good and bad, that makes and unfolds error, Now take upon me, in the name of Time, To use my wings. Impute it not a crime To me or my swift passage, that I slide O'er sixteen years and leave the growth untried Of that wide gap, since it is in my power To o'erthrow law and in one self-born hour To plant and o'erwhelm custom. Let me pass The same I am, ere ancient'st order was Or what is now received: I witness to The times that brought them in; so shall I do To the freshest things now reigning and make stale The glistering of this present, as my tale Now seems to it. Your patience this allowing, I turn my glass and give my scene such growing As you had slept between: Leontes leaving, The effects of his fond jealousies so grieving That he shuts up himself, imagine me, Gentle spectators, that I now may be In fair Bohemia, and remember well, I mentioned a son o' the king's, which Florizel I now name to you; and with speed so pace To speak of Perdita, now grown in grace Equal with wondering: what of her ensues I list not prophecy; but let Time's news Be known when 'tis brought forth. A shepherd's daughter, And what to her adheres, which follows after, Is the argument of Time. Of this allow, If ever you have spent time worse ere now; If never, yet that Time himself doth say He wishes earnestly you never may.

Act 4: scene i

Shepherd: Fie, daughter! when my old wife lived, upon This day she was both pantler, butler, cook, Both dame and servant; welcomed all, served all; Would sing her song and dance her turn; now here, At upper end o' the table, now i' the middle; On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire With labour and the thing she took to quench it, She would to each one sip. You are retired, As if you were a feasted one and not The hostess of the meeting: pray you, bid These unknown friends to's welcome; for it is A way to make us better friends, more known. Come, quench your blushes and present yourself That which you are, mistress o' the feast: come on, And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing, As your good flock shall prosper.

[Comparing the mature confidence of an adult woman to the awkward shyness of a teenager, at her first big social gathering/role as hostess]

[Later, at the same feast]

POLIXENES: Soft, swain, awhile, beseech you; Have you a father?

FLORIZEL: I have: but what of him?

POLIXENES: Knows he of this?

FLORIZEL: He neither does nor shall.

POLIXENES: Methinks a father Is at the nuptial of his son a guest That best becomes the table. Pray you once more, Is not your father grown incapable Of reasonable affairs? is he not stupid With age and altering rheums? can he speak? hear? Know man from man? dispute his own estate? Lies he not bed-rid? and again does nothing But what he did being childish?

FLORIZEL: No, good sir; He has his health and ampler strength indeed Than most have of his age.

POLIXENES: By my white beard, You offer him, if this be so, a wrong Something unfilial: reason my son Should choose himself a wife, but as good reason The father, all whose joy is nothing else But fair posterity, should hold some counsel In such a business.

[Remember: this is the same son that, 16 years earlier, in Act 1, Polixenes had said: "He's all my exercise, my mirth, my matter" Also, this exchange is a call back to the mention of "they that go on crutches" (code marker for "elderly" in general) that opened the play in Act 1 scene i]